The new reconstruction
Real Canaan-Ethiopia
Locating Egypt is the key to locating Canaan-Ethiopia. We know that Canaan-Ethiopia was Egypt’s next-door neighbor and that it was located south of Egypt and upstream upon the Nile-Orontes.
Key regions of Canaan-Ethiopia were as such:
- The Plain of the Canaan-Ethiopia was clearly a portion of the Al Ghab region.
- The island Tachompso, Ammon, the tributaries Astapus and Astaboras, the Sea of the Plain, that were all on the Plain of Canaan-Ethiopia, too were located in the Al Ghab depression. This is why it is said that Ammon, which was upon the island, was at one time on the Reed Sea.
- A sizable portion of the Al Ghab depression was home to various marshy water bodies. The largest of these was the Reed Sea.
- Edom was located in the northern half of the Jabal an Nusayriyah, primarily on its westward slope.
- Ancient Israel was located in the southern half of the Jabal an Nusayriyah again on its westward slope. The Half-Gilead settlement was however, on the island Tachompso located in the Al Ghab depression.
This then is the theoretical picture. The region may well stretch out; the real picture may encompass more territory. A detailed on-the-ground archaeological study alone will iron out the minor kinks in this picture.
If the region indeed stretches out, then it may well extend all the way to Hama in Syria. Then perhaps the Homs Basin was the Plain of Canaan-Ethiopia and the large inland reservoir located in this region, the Qattina Lake, where previously a large lake existed in antiquity, was perhaps the Sea of the Plain. In this scenario, Qatna, which occupies a half-mile square region and is one of the biggest Bronze Age ruin in western Syria and lies between Hama and Homs; would make a perfect Meroe. The two tributaries of the Orontes, one of which is called the Wadi il-Aswad, which are present in this region, may well be Astapus and Astaboras. The fact that Meroe was situated on the edge of a plateau (the limestone-plateau of the Syrian Desert) mentioned by Strabo, is borne out by this setting. The kingdom of Israel will continue to remain in the Jabal an Nusayriyah Mountains in this alternative setting as well.
Real Egypt
According to my hypothesis, ancient Egypt was in modern-day Turkey and Syria. Egypt extended along the River Orontes (the Nile in my scenario), occupying say about five miles on either side of the river.
Key regions of ancient Egypt were in the following regions:
- The Tongue of the Egyptian Sea was located in the wide corridor between Samandagi on the coast and Antakya in the interior.
- The islands of the sea, such as Tyre, Pharos-Alexandria-Antioch, were also in the Samandagi-Antakya corridor. These islands ceased to be islands at a later date and this transformation too is recorded in ancient world histories.
- Mt Casius, Lake Serbonis, the Gerrha or saltpan regions were all also located in the Samandagi-Antakya corridor.
- Delta Region or Lower Egypt was in the triangular Amik Ovasi depression (Amug Valley) in Turkey’s Hatay district. There are literally hundreds of Tells or ruin-mounds (more than 300 sites have been identified) in this region that will undoubtedly testify this fact.
- Upper Egypt was in a valley between the Jabal an Nusayriyah Mountains and Jabel El Wastani.
- The Reed Sea (Red Sea) was a vast marshy sea and was situated in the Al Ghab basin, which, before it was drained and reclaimed by the Syrian government, did present itself as such until very recently. It no longer exists of course. Watermarks are evident though, halfway up the mountains in this region, and can still be seen. The Gulf of Arabia was a long narrow gulf of this sea that lay east of the Jabel El Wastani Mountain.
As mentioned before, magnificent ruins lie scattered all across this above-identified region. Many of them and especially the ones loosely classified as ‘Phoenician and or Roman’ are probably Egyptian. Ruins on the eastern side of the Al Ghab are probably Arabian.
Incidentally, modern-day scholars, as a token gesture, do include the East Mediterranean coastal belt all the way up to modern-day Syria, as extended territories of ancient Egypt. They have done this primarily to include pockets of evidence in this region, such as the battlefields of the Kadesh-on-the-Orontes skirmish in modern-day Syria, and possibly, to satisfy textual evidence, especially biblical, wherein it is stated that the Exodus trail (Sinai regions) and even Canaan was once Egyptian territory.
This then is where and how I would place ancient Egypt in my brand-new reconstruction. It is a theoretical picture and may require fine-tuning with detailed on-the-ground exploration and study, which I will be undertaking shortly.
Diagram above: Egypt and Canaan-Ethiopia. The concurrently derived geographical map of Egypt and Canaan-Ethiopia. It is seen here to fit well on a modern-day topographical map of the Near Eastern arena (Turkey-Syria region). Egypt was primarily in the Amik Ovasi depression in the Hatay district in modern-day Turkey whereas Canaan-Ethiopia was in the Al Ghab depression located to its south in modern-day Syria.
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